


Reading Rainbow

by DizzyRedhead



Series: 1000 Follower Giveaway Fics [2]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe, First Meetings, Librarian Lardo, Librarian Nursey, Librarians, M/M, Meet-Cute, Prompt Fill, Single Parent Dex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-04-20 00:09:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14248821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DizzyRedhead/pseuds/DizzyRedhead
Summary: Derek was not adequately prepared for a Hot Bearded Dad to show up at his preschool storytime.





	Reading Rainbow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dievampiredie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dievampiredie/gifts).



> Written as part of my 1000 follower giveaway for dievampiredie, who requested "Nursey is a librarian (either a children’s librarian or he had to cover for someone in the children’s area) and Dex is a single dad who brings his kid to preschool story hour." Thanks for letting me get some librarian feels all over our boys and I'm only sorry that I don't have the time to write a full novel of their dating life and slow-build romance. Maybe someday! In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this!!!
> 
> Thanks to Liz, Foz, and Ant for loving it and especially to Ant for coming up with the awesome title!!!
> 
> More random notes about this AU in the endnotes!

“Hot bearded dad alert,” Larissa says, grabbing one end of the rolled-up storytime carpet. 

“Dammit,” Derek mutters, doing his best to keep his voice down--the storage closet is a bit echoey and the last thing he needs is for some precocious preschooler to start chanting swear words as they run around the meeting room. “You can’t just say sh--stuff like that--”

The flow of words cuts off as he finally exits the closet, because it’s immediately obvious who she was talking about. His regular preschool storytime group is mostly moms, with a few grandmas, aunts, and the occasional nanny sprinkled in for variety. It’s not very often that they get a dad, gender stereotypes being what they are even in the greater New York metro area. There have been a few, here and there, but Derek can’t remember the last dad who looked like this.

Hot Bearded Dad laughs at something the small child in his lap says, thankfully distracted, because the last thing Derek needs is to have this guy realize how blatantly Derek’s checking him out. His bright red hair is vivid even under the gross fluorescents in the meeting room, curling slightly around his ears like he’s forgotten to get it cut recently, and his neatly-trimmed beard is just a shade darker. He’s grinning down at his child, eyes crinkled at the corners.

“Dude, get a grip,” Larissa mutters, tugging on her end of the carpet to get him moving again.

“Right,” Derek answers, following her to the cleared area where he does storytime. There are already some of his regulars playing in the space, but they scatter when they see Derek and Larissa approaching, making room for them to unroll the carpet. 

Of course, they pounce as soon as the carpet is even close to the floor, because three- to five-year-olds aren’t know for their impulse control, but Derek has gotten very good at snapping the carpet open quickly since he took over the preschool storytime. 

The experienced kids settle down on the carpet right away while Derek returns to the closet for his cart, doing his best not to ogle Hot Bearded Dad in the process. He only trips over his own feet twice, which is honestly lower than his average, so he figures he’s doing okay.

“Okay,” he says brightly as he turns on the Bluetooth speaker and makes sure it’s synced to his iPad before settling down cross-legged in front of the carpet. “Good morning everyone. If you’re ready to get started, I need everyone sitting down on the carpet or with your grownup.”

There’s a brief scramble for the free spaces on the carpet, with the shyer children staying with their parents. Hot Bearded Dad whispers in his child’s ear for a second, before she nods and slide down from his lap to take the last open place at the back of the carpet. 

Her dark hair is pulled back in a ponytail with wisps falling down around her serious face. She’s wearing a Falcon t-shirt and pink flowered leggings and Derek cannot handle how cute she is. Her nametag says “Amaya,” he sees before he tears his eyes away and does his best to focus on, you know, doing his job.

It’s a good thing Derek can do storytime basically in his sleep at this point, because the whole thing is mostly a blur, but he’s pretty sure Makayla would have pointed it out if he forgot anything. Sometimes he thinks she could run storytime if anything happened to him. He’s going to miss her when she goes to kindergarten in the fall.

It takes a supreme effort of will not to look up at Hot Bearded Dad every other minute. But Derek is an information professional, dammit, so he focuses on the greeting song, on the ocean-themed flannel-board, on reading their first story (“Barnacle is Bored”) with as much expression and as many funny voices as he can fit into it.

“Okay,” he announces once he closes the book. “I think it’s time to get some wiggles out, what do you think?”

“Yeah!” the kids chorus, leaping to their feet.

He hits play on the iPad, watching in amusement as the kids bust out their dance moves. As much as he wishes “Shake Your Sillies Out” didn’t get stuck in his head, it’s always worth it.

The rest of storytime goes smoothly--”Narwhal: Unicorn of the Sea” is a big hit, especially with the Narwhal and Jelly finger puppets he’d picked up. 

“Okay,” he says finally. “Who’s ready for bubbles?”

“Me!” “I am!” “Me Me Me!!”

He laughs, pulling out his fish-shaped bubble machine and starting up the instrumental mix he always plays for bubble time on the iPad. “All right, chill.”

The kids have fun chasing the bubbles around the room, yelling for their parents to notice when they pop a bubble or cluster of bubbles. Amaya, he notices, stays close to her dad, until she manages to catch a large bubble on her palm and turns to Derek with a blinding smile. 

“I caught it!” she exclaims, extending her hand toward him. “See?”

“You sure did!” he replies, leaning forward to see. “It’s so big! Do you want to show your dad?”

Her smile gets even wider. “Yeah!”

And then of course he has to watch her run back to Hot Bearded Dad with her bubble. Fortunately Aiden catches his attention before he can stare too ridiculously. And then the playlist is over and Derek turns off the bubble machine again, unmoved as always by the begging and pleading and, in Jasmine’s case, attempt at outright bribery. Unfortunately for her, Derek hasn’t been swayed by the promise of a unicorn eraser since he was in fourth grade.

“Bubbles will be back next week,” he promises, putting the machine back on the cart. “But now it’s toy time!”

The kids cheer and scatter to make room for him to dump out the tub of toys and Derek watches with a mixture of amusement and jealousy as the three single moms that Larissa dubbed the Terrible Trio make a beeline for Hot Bearded Dad.

They’re not even trying to be subtle about it, he notices as he busies himself making sure everything is put away in the correct place on his cart, turning off the speaker and locking his iPad. Stephanie has a hand on his arm, Rebecca “call me Becky” is literally twirling a lock of hair around her finger, and Lauren is looking at him like she wants to climb him like a tree. 

Not that Derek can blame them. HBD is tall, maybe as tall as Derek, and his shoulders fill out his plaid shirt nicely. The rolled-up sleeves accentuate his nicely muscular forearms, Derek notices, before he catches the pleading look being thrown his way.

Hunted isn’t a good look on this guy, Derek rationalizes as he walks over. He’s just being sociable. It’s good professional practice to greet new parents the first time they attend storytime, make them feel welcome. 

He’s never been good at lying to himself.

“Hi,” he says once he catches an opening in Stephanie’s interrogation--Makayla comes by her laser focus honestly. “I’m Derek. Is this your first time coming to storytime here?”

“Yeah,” HBD replies, relief in his eyes as he accepts Derek’s hand and shakes. “I’m Will, Amaya’s dad. We just moved to this neighborhood a week ago, which is how long she can handle life without a visit to the library.”

Derek laughs. “A girl after my own heart. Where did you move from?”

“Maine, actually,” Will says, shifting his body language subtly to exclude the Terrible Trio, who aren’t actually that terrible aside from their complete inability to chill. “Could I look at those books you read? I like to take pictures of them, so when she asks about “the narwhal book” a few weeks later, I have a basis to start Googling.”

“Sure,” Derek agrees easily, gesturing Will toward his cart. “Come on over.”

True to his word, Will snaps photos of each book on Derek’s cart. “Thanks,” he mutters under his breath. “Are they always this…”

“Aggressively friendly?” Derek finishes. “Only when a hot, possibly single dad shows up to storytime. So like, twice that I’ve seen.”

Will blushes, going pink under his freckles as Derek watches in fascination. “I, uh.”

“Dude, this can’t be the first time somebody told you you were hot,” Derek says, because he uses up all his brain-to-mouth filter on not cursing in front of the kids. “Like, do you own a mirror?”

“I--” 

Whatever reply Will was going to make is cut off when Amaya tugs at his hand. “Daddy? Can we pick out books now.”

“Sure, sweetie,” he agrees, his cheeks still pink, even as his face goes soft when he looks down at her. “But first can you say thank you to Mr. Derek for the nice storytime.”

She turns toward Derek. “Thank you, Mr. Derek. I want to be a liberrian when I grow up, too. But I don’t want to do storytimes.”

He does his best to keep a straight face. “No?”

“No,” she shakes her head. “I just want to read books.”

“I’m sure you’ll be a great librarian when you grow up,” he tells her, doing his best to keep a straight face. “What’s your favorite book?”

“It used to be  _ Dinosaur Versus Bedtime, _ ” she says slowly, as if considering it carefully. “But Daddy’s been reading me  _ The Princess In Black  _ and I think that’s my new favorite. It has chapters.”

Derek can’t help but smile at that. “Chapters are pretty cool. When you finish the first book, we have the other three in the series for you to check out.” 

Amaya’s eyes go round. “Really really?”

“Really really,” he tells her. “Cross my heart.”

“Can you show us where?” she asks.

Will takes her hand. “We need to let Mr. Derek finish up with his job in here, but I bet there’s a librarian who can show us the books once we get out in the library, okay?”

“Okay,” she says, following Will as he heads for the door. “Can we come back to storytime next week?”

“Whatever you want,” Will promises, shooting a last look back over his shoulder at Derek. 

* * *

Two days later, Derek sighs a little as he steps out of the library staff entrance. It’s been a long day, with what felt like half of the staff out with some sort of stomach bug that’s been flattening people left and right. Despite washing his hands at least twenty times today, the hypochondriac struggle is super real and he finds himself constantly checking to see if he’s starting to feel nauseated.

Basically, he’s mentally exhausted and ready to head home and hide in his apartment with Chinese takeout until he has to leave again tomorrow morning.

Until he remembers that he’s down to almost no toilet paper as of this morning. For a long moment he considers just putting it off, but with his luck, the stomach bug will hit him overnight and leave him wishing for death AND for toilet paper.

Sighing more deeply, he starts trying to figure out which Duane Reade on his walk home is likely to be the least crowded; he supports his local bodega as much as possible, but the last time he bought his toilet paper from there, it was so thin he could read his book through it and scratched like pinecones. There are some sacrifices he’s not willing to make. 

The store he finally settles on doesn’t look too packed, just a couple of people that he can see through the storefront. He pulls open the door and heads inside with a purposeful step.  _ You’re just here for one thing, _ he tells himself, trying to keep his eyes unfocused.  _ You don’t need candy, or ice cream, or whatever unnaturally good flavor of creamer International Delight has come up with now. Get in, get the paper, get out. _

Of course, being himself, he manages to catch an endcap display with his elbow as he rounds the corner, but in a startling turn of events, he doesn’t actually knock anything down. He’s so startled by this occurrence--what kind of dark magic is going on here?--that he runs smack into someone as he’s looking back over his shoulder.

“I’m so sorry,” he starts, the words falling from his lips with automatic ease, when he realizes who exactly he just ran into. “Oh, Will, right? Hi.”

“Hi,” Will says back, his eyes still crinkling at the corners exactly the way Derek remembers. Not that he’s thought about it. Much. “Are you okay?”

Derek grins. “I should be asking you that, dude. Sorry about the walking into you thing. I should’ve been looking where I was going.”

“No problem,” Will says, smiling back.

It’s only then that Derek realizes how close they’re still standing, a bare few inches of space between them, Will’s big hands warm and solid where they’re still wrapped around his arms. 

Will seems to realize it at the same time, letting go and leaving Derek feeling oddly cold where his hands had been, but he doesn’t step back. “I, uh, I didn’t get a chance to ask you the other day, and anyway, it’s kind of weird to do it in your workplace and I don’t wanna be that guy--”

“Daddy! Daddy, they have fishy crackers can I get some please please please?” Amaya asks, plowing between them like an icebreaker, refusing to be diverted from her course. “Oh, hi Mr. Derek. Daddy, please?”

“You can get a smaller package than that,” Will says firmly, taking the carton of Goldfish from Amaya’s arms before she topples over from the weight. Considering it’s almost as big as she is, Derek’s pretty impressed--and pretty jealous of the Hawkeye t-shirt she’s paired with polka-dot shorts today.  “Go get one of the small bags and you can have a little bowl for a snack in the afternoons after quiet time.”

Amaya beams, apparently not even a little bit bothered by the restructuring of her grand plan. “Okay!” And then she’s back off down the adjacent aisle, still within view as she intently ponders her purchase options.

“Sorry,” Will says, hefting the giant carton easily in one arm and running the other one through his hair in a clearly habitual gesture. “We’re still working on interruptions.”

“No worries,” Derek says easily. “Goldfish are important.”

Will laughs. “Apparently.”

“So, uh, you were saying?” Derek prompts, when it seems like the conversation is about to die.

“Oh! Yeah. I uh, I was wondering if you wanted to get dinner sometime? Or coffee. Whatever works, really,” Will trails off, his eyes firmly fixed on the floor at his feet.

Derek blinks, reordering his assumptions a little. “I--yeah, I’d like that.”

“Really?” Will asks, looking up to meet his eyes. “I mean, okay, maybe I can get your number before Hurricane Amaya gets back?”

“Yeah,” Derek agrees, taking the offered phone and typing in his contact info. He sends a quick text to himself so he’ll have Will’s number, too, before handing it back just as Amaya returns with a bag of the multicolored Goldfish crackers. 

“Is this a small bag?” she asks, lifting it up to compare it to the bulk package she’d had before. 

Will smiles down at her, soft and clearly adoring even with the touches of impatience around the edges. “It’s smaller, so I think that’ll work. How about we put this one away and then go pay so we can go home and eat dinner?”

“Yeah!” she agrees. “I’ll show you!” 

“I’ll text you?” Will says quietly as he turns to follow in her wake. 

Derek nods, even though Will has already turned away. “Yeah.”

It takes him a minute to remember what it was he came to the store for in the first place, and then another minute to locate the toilet paper--and still another to stand in the aisle and make sure Will’s number is entered in his phone as Hot Bearded Dad Will. He checks out, successfully resisting the urge of the candy display by the register, and makes his way toward home. 

His phone buzzes in his pocket just as he’s unlocking his door. There’s a precarious moment where he’s incompetently juggling his keys, the toilet paper, and his phone, but he finally manages to drop the keys on their hook by the door, the toilet paper on the floor just inside, and kick the door closed while pulling the phone into his chest to safeguard it.

He half-expects it to be some random notification when he finally checks the screen, but it’s actually a text from Will.  _ so, dinner or coffee? I work from home so i can do either _

_ dinner’s good, _ he sends back, vaguely aware that he’s smiling wide enough to feel an unfamiliar stretch in his cheeks.  _ I’m off early Friday? _

_ I’ll get a sitter, _ is the near-immediate response.  _ Any allergies i should know about? _

_ Nah, I’m chill. Surprise me _

_ Okay, i’ll text you once we have a reservation. Seven okay? _

Derek sends back a thumbs-up emoji.  _ Perfect _

_ It’s a date _ , Will replies, and then a string of smiling blushing faces.

“It sure is,” Derek says out loud. It’s just a first date, but he has a good feeling about this one.

**Author's Note:**

> In case anyone was wondering, since I probably don't have time to write more of this AU, Amaya was born to Dex's high school best friend who didn't want an abortion but also didn't want to juggle a baby and med school. Dex had just graduated and scored a software development job that he could work from home and his parents thought he was nuts for adopting a baby on his own, but they couldn't talk him out of it. 
> 
> Derek and Larissa met in library school and hit it off right away; he helped her with projects requiring lots of writing and she helped him think creatively and plan lots of STEAM-related projects. He introduced her to Shitty, which she says she's still trying to figure out how to forgive him for. But since they just moved in together, he's pretty sure she's joking. Them working together at the same library took a few years to make happen, but now they've gotten the band back together and they couldn't be happier. 
> 
> If you like NurseyDex content, you might enjoy [following me on Tumblr](http://dizzy-redhead.tumblr.com). And if you're into hockey players in love, you can [follow my author blog](http://ariel-bishop.tumblr.com).


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